[165] Robert Ket was a comparatively rich man, and to some extent a landowner, by reason of which he came into connection with the nobleman who afterwards had him killed—Northumberland. Ket bought Wymondham Abbey at the Dissolution, and also possessed a large part of Wymondham Town, and certain rich lands between that place and the royal manorhouse of Stanfield Hall. These lands had been bestowed on the brotherhood of St. Lazarus of Jerusalem—an offshoot of the Order of Hospitallers of St. John, who devoted their time to the relief of the sick poor—by Queen Adelicia, second wife of Henry I. Later on, Ket sold these ex-monastic lands to John Dudley, afterwards Duke of Northumberland—the suppressor of the Ket rebellion! Blomefield (Norfolk, article on “Wyndham or Wymondham”) indeed attributes the cause of that outbreak to a disagreement between the Ket brothers and Northumberland over these lands. “John Dudley,” says he, “bought some of these charity lands of Ket the tanner. As for payment, it was done in his own particular mode.... The two brothers (Ket), finding Dudley meant to pull down the magnificent tower, the preservation of which was most dear to their affections, raised the Norfolk poor, whom extreme misery had driven to discontent, and Wymondham became the nucleus of the great Norfolk rebellion.” It is much more likely that indignation at the general state of things, social and religious, under Somerset’s Protectorship, was at the bottom of this popular rising, and not mere platonic affection for an ancient tower.
[166] William Ket’s remains were given “a dip in boiling pitch,” and then hanged, in their monastic dress, in chains. They continued, like a ghastly scarecrow, to ornament Wymondham Church until 1603, when they began to fall, bone by bone, the last piece coming away on the very day of Queen Elizabeth’s death, 25th March 1603.
[167] Printed in Tytler’s England under Edward VI and Mary, vol. i. p. 205.
[168] Mr. Pollard says that Herbert’s private park had been ploughed up, whilst Russell “had been reprimanded for exceeding his instructions in his severity towards the rebels.” It is interesting to learn, by the way, that Somerset did make some effort to check the butcheries in the West.
[169] In making all these warlike preparations Somerset was acting on the mere premise—since Petre had never returned to Hampton Court, and he had no news from the metropolis—that Warwick contemplated some sort of coup d’état; for no open act of violence had been perpetrated. The revolution of 1549, which practically placed Warwick in the Protectorship and Somerset (temporarily) in the Tower, proved successful, as we shall presently see, but it was an entirely bloodless victory.
[170] In addition to his incipient consumption, the poor little King would seem to have caught a cold on his original journey to Hampton Court. The Literary Remains say, “The Kinge’s Majesty is much troubled with a great rewme; taken partly while riding hither in the night” (vol. i. p. cxxxi).
[171] This nobleman was created Earl of Warwick on his father’s assumption of the title of Duke of Northumberland, and under that title was imprisoned in the Tower, which has been the cause of some confusion to students.
[172] 9th May 1550.
[173] This letter is still extant, and seems to point to a possibility that Lady Seymour’s mysterious retirement may have been due to her perseverance in the old faith.
[174] At the same time the Marquis of Dorset was made Duke of Suffolk; Paulet, Earl of Wiltshire, was raised to the Marquisate of Winchester; Sir William Herbert, Master of the Horse, was made Earl of Pembroke; and Mr. William Cecil, Mr. John Cheke, the King’s tutor, Henry Sidney, and Henry Nevil, were knighted.